Memories of Auschwitz as Excuse not to Shower

Nursing homes in Chicago are organizing their residents on ethnic lines, where each group has its own traditional food, activities, and a staff that speaks its language. Specialized ethnic care can be helpful, advocates argue. Nursing homes must be aware, for example, of elderly Jewish residents for whom a trip to the shower may trigger memories of the Holocaust. (Yahoo News, Oct. 12, 2004) Jews who remember this today must have experienced proper water showers in Auschwitz, though, or otherwise they would not be in these nursing homes today.

Germans Demand War Reparations

When German Chancellor Schroder visited Poland to mark the 60th anniversary of the Warsaw uprising, it inspired the Federation of German Expellees to make demands on Poland. Rudi Pawelka, head of Preussische Treuhand, which represents the interests of the former inhabitants of East Prussia, indicated he will initiate court action in Germany and before the European Court of Justice. He claims that because Poland is now a member of the European Union, claims on it are now appropriate. (The Washington Times, August 10, 2004) Warsaw resident Izabela Brodacka wanted to be the first Pole to take the German government to court over compensation for suffering caused during World War II. (Bloomberg, September 2, 2004) Shortly thereafter, Germany and Poland signed a contract ruling out any civil law suits of their citizens against each other over WWII issues and its aftermath.

IBM asks court to block US$12 billion Holocaust suit

IBM has asked a Swiss court to block a $12 billion dollar lawsuit filed by a Gypsy organization alleging that the computer giant’s punch card machines used by Germany facilitated the murder of gypsies during World War II. IBM claims that it had no control of its German subsidiary during the war. The charges primarily stem from research done by writer Irwin Black, who in 2001 published a book titled IBM and the Holocaust, in which he claimed that IBM supplied the Nazis with both hardware and the software of the day to “computerize” the Holocaust bureaucracy. (IT News, Sept. 6, 2004)

Jewish Students Criticized at Auschwitz

A group of university students from Israel, Poland, and the US were verbally ‘attacked’ by three French males while visiting the Auschwitz camps. The students were accused of using Auschwitz as a publicity tool for pro-Israeli propaganda. (Jerusalem Post, Aug. 11, 2004)

Treblinka, Chelmno, Sobibor to Get Museums

Yad Vashem and the government of Poland are going to build a museum at the former Treblinka camp. It is claimed that about 870,000 people were murdered there. In the future, similar museums will be opened at the former camps at Chelmno and Sobibor. At the same time, the final wording of a memorial plaque in memory of the Jews murdered by fellow Poles in the northeastern Polish village of Jedwabne is still the subject of controversy, and the final text of the memorial plaque may not be ready for years. A recent book documenting the killing of thousands of Jews in Jedwabne by their Polish neighbors—and not, as previously thought by the Nazi occupiers—caused a major stir in Poland, after decades, in which Poles often portrayed themselves as equal victims to the Jews during World War II. (J.T. Gross, Neighbors, Princeton University Press, 2001; Jerusalem Post, Aug. 20, 2004)

Hunt for Swedish ‘War Criminals’ off Limits

In an unprecedented act of civil courage, Sweden keeps its WWII archives closed to researchers hunting for geriatric veterans who fought against the Soviets and are suspected by Jewish head hunters to have been involved in mostly trumped-up Holocaust charges (Jerusalem Post, Aug. 15, 2004).

Citizenship of Alleged NS Camp Guard Revoked

84 year old Joseph Wittje of Bensenville, Illinois, was stripped of his US citizenship and accused by the Justice Department of hiding his membership in an SS battalion that provided guards at the Sachsenhausen camp where thousands died. The government said that because the Waffen SS was a movement hostile to the United States, Wittje was not lawfully admitted to this country when he was granted citizenship in 1959. (AP, Aug. 28, 2004)

Germany Breaks Hitler Taboo with “The Downfall”

A decades-long taboo was broken in Germany in August 2004 with the launch of a movie in which Adolf Hitler appears for the first time in a central role, not as a ranting demagogue but as a soft-spoken dreamer. “The Downfall” is a huge shift from the previous tendency in German cinema to show Hitler only as a background figure or an insane character. It tells the story of the last 12 days of Hitler’s life in his 25ft-deep bunker in Berlin, including his suicide alongside his new wife Eva Braun on April 30, 1945, while advancing Soviet troops pulverize the city with shellfire. (Daily Telegraph, Aug. 24, 2004)

Croatians Weep as Wartime Pride is Erased

In an attempt to please European bureaucrats in order to get their approval to join the European Union, Croatia has conducted its first “de-Nazification” since the country became independent in 1991. Under heavy police security, two plaques commemorating war-time officials were removed: one about Mile Budak, war-time education minister, and the other about the former Ustasha military commander Jure Francetic, founder of the Black Legion. Few Croatians show shame about the country’s former liaison with Hitler. Several Croats wept as workers took away the plaques under an escort provided by special police forces. Croatia is also preparing amendments to its penal code to ban the promotion of all totalitarian ideologies, including communism and fascism. (Daily Telegraph, Aug. 28, 2004)

German Dissident’s Bank Account and Home Seized

Dr. Rudolf Großkopf, a retired physicist, accidentally learned about revisionism in the early 1990s and made contact with German revisionist publisher Germar Rudolf in 1995. For several years now, Dr. Großkopf was a pro forma co-signer of a bank account owned by Rudolf, which was used by Rudolf’s German customers to pay their invoices. End of August 2004, the German government ordered the bank account seized, and declared that Rudolf owed the German authorities all amounts ever earned by the sale of historical literature deemed illegal in Germany. Since Rudolf was unreachable, the police arrested Dr. Großkopf instead and confiscated his car and home, even though he was never involved in Rudolf’s business. Dr. Großkopf was released after paying a bail of some $400,000. (Der Spiegel, no. 41, Oct. 2, 2004; Stuttgarter Nachrichten, Oct. 6, 2004.)

Ernst Zündel’s Appeal Rejected

The Supreme Court of Canada refused to hear the appeal filed by German-born Revisionist Ernst Zündel. As of February 2005, Zündel has been held in solitary confinement in Canada for two years. He has not been charged with any crime, but is merely considered a threat to Canada’s security, based upon secret evidence. The Supreme Court rubberstamped this outrageous act. (GrandForks Herald, Sept. 30)

Estonian Mayor Writes Revisionist Book

Tiit Madisson, mayor of the town of Lihula, Estonia, has written a revisionist book called “New World Order,” which claims that Jews and Masons brought Hitler to power, that Hitler and some of his leading minions were Jews, that there were no mass killings of Jews during the war, and that the supposedly few Jews who did die in the camps were killed by diseases, not poison gas. He also writes that Masons continue to rule Estonia today. The book might be illegal under Estonia’s recently enacted anti-incitement laws. (Postimees and Meie Maa, Sept. 7, 2004)

Anti-Jewish Writings Found in Paris Main Library

Several books were recently rubberstamped with anti-Jewish inscriptions at the main public library in Paris. A dozen books about the Dreyfus case and legal issues were vandalized. They were rubberstamped on their edge with the words “Against the Jewish Mafia and Jewish Racism” followed by the addresses of a revisionist and an Islamic website. (Jerusalem Post, August 26, 2004)

Students Create Stir with Buchenwald Souvenirs

The Bauhaus University in Weimar has begun to create concentration camp souvenirs – until then a taboo topic. The idea sprang from the Buchenwald Memorial, which had until then merely offered books and postcards in its assortment of souvenirs. Now any tourist visiting the Goethe and Schiller city of Weimar can add a souvenir hunt in former concentration camp Buchenwald. (New York Times, Sept. 16, 2004)

Using boredom to fight hate. France to distribute copies of ‘Shoah’ film in anti-hate drive

Claude Lanzmann’ 1985 nine-hour film Shoah, has been copied to DVD and will be made available to France’s 5,500 elite high schools in an effort to fight France’s growing anti-Judaism. The number of anti-Jewish attacks within the past year has tripled. (Ha’aretz, Sept. 15, 2004) Is Lanzmann aware that spreading Jewish propaganda only increases hostilities toward Jews? But then again, maybe that is what he wants.

Jews Condemn Flick’s Berlin Art Show

‘Blood money’ was the cry mainly of Jewish organizations as Friedrich Christian Flick’s art exhibition opened in Berlin, paid mainly with money he inherited from his ancestors. Flick is the Grandson of Friedrich Flick, a former arms manufacturer and steel magnate who equipped the Wehrmacht with weapons. Friedrich Christian, however, deflects any kind of guilt-trip that his art collection was tainted, pointing out that “My grandfather had slave laborers in his firm. That was unjust, but he was sentenced for it. That was just. I don’t believe you can inherit guilt. I believe you can inherit responsibility.” (West Australian, Sept. 22, 2004)

Global Holocaust Denial Bill Passed in Knesset

Legislation that would make Holocaust denial committed overseas an offence under Israeli legal jurisdiction was approved unanimously in first reading by the Knesset on July 20, 2004. The passage of the measure would enable Israel to demand the extradition of Holocaust deniers for prosecution. The bill was drafted as a move against former Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) for his doctoral dissertation 20 years ago, in which he estimated that the Germans killed less than a million Jews. It is likely to serve as a deterrence against Holocaust deniers visiting Israel, although the possibility of countries consenting to extradition on the offence is unlikely. The legislation expands the territorial jurisdiction of the Israeli law against Holocaust-denying outside of it borders. (Jerusalem Post, July 20, 2004)

South Australia to Legislate against Racism

Following on from New South Wales and Victoria, South Australia will introduce legislation condemning anti-Semitism and racism. In a speech to B’nai B’rith Adelaide chapter, South Australian Premier Mike Rann confirmed that the Racial Vilification Bill would be introduced into State Parliament soon. “I hope this bipartisan motion will send a clear and unequivocal message that we will never accept violence directly against individuals, religious and cultural institutions,” Rann said. The South Australian initiative came about through lobbying by the B’nai B’rith Anti-Defamation Commission (ADC), Victoria’s anti-racism watchdog. ADC chairman Dr Paul Gardner said Rann had agreed to introduce the bill to parliament but failed to provide a time frame. He said Australia’s existing state and federal bills broadly condemn all manifestations of racism. (Australian Jewish News, Aug. 6, 2004)

Wal-Mart Ends Sale of the Protocols

Bending to Jewish pressure, America’s largest retailer, Wal-Mart Inc., has stopped selling The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion. The description, now withdrawn from the Wal-Mart Web site, said, “If ... The Protocols are genuine (which can never be proven conclusively), it might cause some of us to keep a wary eye on world affairs. We neither support nor deny its message. We simply make it available for those who wish a copy.” Both Barnes & Noble and Amazon.com sell “The Protocols” online but with strong disclaimers. (Reuters, September 24, 2004)

K.R. Bolton’s 2003 book, The Protocols of Zion in Context: The Doctrine of the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion in the Context of Religion, History & Politics, clarifies a number of issues. It is available for $15.00 New Zealand, from Renaissance Press, P.O. Box 1627, Paraparaumu Beach, New Zealand

AOL Leads Political Censorship in U.S.A.?

Some months ago the email newsletter Mid-East Realities (MER) was subject to censorship by the Internet service provider AOL. Subscribers complained and MER again began to arrive in email letter boxes. Now censorship has again reared its ugly head, and MER has stopped arriving. (www.middleeast.org/, Oct. 6, 2004)

FBI Seizes Indymedia Servers in U.S. and U.K.

In late August 2004, several lists of Republican National Convention delegates were posted on IndyMedia sites, including home and e-mail addresses and the New York area hotels at which they were staying. Subsequently a U.S. federal grand jury, at the behest of the Secret Service, began investigating and subpoenaed a Web hosting service, Calyx Internet Access, for IndyMedia contact info. Allegedly Italy and Switzerland asked the U.S. for help in suppressing the material on IndyMedia sites, which is why the U.S. went to British authorities, cited a treaty between the two countries, and obtained permission from Britain’s Home Office to seize IndyMedia’s computers. The FBI insists that it was just trying to help out Italy and Switzerland in their investigation.

The International Federation of Journalists has called for an investigation into the FBI-led seizure of IndyMedia’s computers in England and elsewhere in the world. The Electronic Frontier Foundation is helping IndyMedia, and the ACLU jumped in to assist IndyMedia as well. (Voice In Focus, Oct. 12, 2004)

Leuchter Report in German by Mainstream Publisher

Teacher, community leader, politician, and ‘Holocaust’ skeptic Gunter Deckert was sentenced to over five years prison, among others for having translated a speech given by Fred Leuchter in November 1991 who claimed that there were no homicidal gas chambers at Auschwitz. On September 24, 2004, Deckert initiated legal action against the German publishing firm Rowohlt who translated and published Stephen Trembley’s book The Execution Protocol. Inside America’s Capital Punishment Industry (New York 1992). In the German edition of Trembley’s book under the chapter “Missouri,” at p. 124ff., the whole Leuchter Report is reproduced, something that could be actionable.

Virus Attack Against Holocaust Promoters

A new computer virus uses infected computers to launch denial-of-service attacks against the Web site “Holocaust History Project” (holocaust-history.org) that vilifies revisionists and tries to refute them with twisted reasonings. (TechWeb News, September 30, 2004) This backfires on revisionism, of course, because suspicions will arise that a revisionist may be the originator of this virus.

UN Weapons Inspector: Iraq Inspection Was Rigged

Scott Ritter, U.N. weapons inspector in Iraq between 1991–1998, says the inspection process was rigged to create uncertainty over WMD to bolster the US and UK’s case for war. The final report on the fake chase for WMD in Iraq by the organization “Iraq Survey Group” has taken away any legitimacy that may still be in the public’s perception that the Bush-Blair invasion of Iraq was justified. Ritter: “ISG report concludes that all of Iraq’s WMD stockpiles had been destroyed in 1991, and WMD programs and facilities dismantled by 1996.” Iraq had been burdened with the impossible task of proving a negative. Hence, the inspection process was pre-programmed to fail. Neither the US nor the UK accepted any finding. (Independent, Oct. 10, 2004) Ritter has written a book about this: Frontier Justice: Weapons of Mass Destruction and the Bushwhacking of America, published by Context Books.

Israelis arrested on 9/11 sue U.S.

Four Israelis arrested in New York on September 11, 2001, a short while after the attacks on the World Trade Center, filed a multi-million-dollar suit in New York District Court on Monday against the American Department of Justice, claiming that their arrests were illegal, and that they were held for months while they were interrogated and tortured. The four were employed by a New Jersey moving firm and were caught filming the attacks and cheering. (Ha’aretz, Sept. 15, 2004)

U.S. to Rate Allies on Treatment of Jews

On October 11, 2004, U.S. Congress endorsed the “Global Anti-Semitism Awareness Act,” which requires the U.S. State Department to publish in its annual survey on world human rights abuses an additional special report on treatment of Jewish citizens, although the State Department has a “special envoy for holocaust issues.” Criticism from within the State Department calling this special treatment of Jews “favoritism” was denounced by Tom Lantos, a California Democrat and Holocaust survivor, as an alarming nod to “anti-Semitic stereotypes.” (News.telegraph, Oct. 13, 2004)

Nuclear Whistleblower Vanunu Explains Motivation

On condition that he not speak to foreigners and to any media, Mordechai Vanunu was released on April 20, 2004 after spending 18 years in an Israeli prison. Yet Vanunu gives interviews to foreigners. Following is an unedited verbatim excerpt of an interview on occasion of his 50th birthday with Tony Jones of ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) TV’s Lateline:

TONY JONES: You’ve called these nuclear bombs that Israel has made holocaust weapons. Why draw the comparison with the Jewish holocaust?

MORDECHAI VANUNU: That is true. Any atomic bomb – one atomic bomb is like a Holocaust because it is genocide. Nuclear weapons are genocide. They are not making any distinction between anyone. They are killing children, elders, women, any human being, even animals.

So the atomic bomb is genocide and Israel who are for 50 years brain washing by their historic Holocaust, they are not allowed to use Holocaust weapon and they should be the first people around the world to be against nuclear weapons, but what we saw is Israel was more aggressive and have the atomic bomb and a lot of atomic bomb – all kinds, and they were ready to use them.

So I was the one to remind them and to let the world see that this is a propaganda of Holocaust is not real, not true because at the same time they are speaking about the Holocaust, they are ready to bring Holocaust on human beings in the Middle East and Arab state.

TONY JONES: Mordechai, what do you say to actual survivors of the Holocaust or their children who say that it is precisely because of these weapons that we can prevent another Holocaust ever happening again?

MORDECHAI VANUNU: What I am telling them to the Israel people in Israel, you who have survived the Holocaust, who have the history of the Holocaust, you should be the first people to be against nuclear weapons and to lead, guide, bring the world towards abolition of nuclear weapons around the world. There is no justification to use atomic bomb. There is no justification to cause Holocaust on other people or genocide. You cannot, even for existence of Israel to use atomic bomb.

In fact, to use atomic bomb will only cause another Holocaust on the Israeli state because that will cause a nuclear war or genocide war with mass destruction weapons, so I believe the Jewish people and I also believe there are many, many people in Israel who are against nuclear weapons, but Israel Government, Israel spy don’t let the people speak, raise, to question, to debate this issue of Holocaust weapon, nuclear weapon, but this cannot be forever. The people will rise and will speak and the all the world now against nuclear weapons and the same Israel, too, must be against nuclear weapons.

TONY JONES: But in this case, you not only gave up Israel’s secrets, you gave up your own religion, you gave up being a Jew. Why was it necessary to stop being a Jew?

MORDECHAI VANUNU: My issue of religion was a long time before this case, it begun in the age of 16, 17, when I was growing and studying in a Jewish religion school and I start questioning this religion and concluded that I am rejecting this Judaism and I should have my own faith, choose my own religion and towards the beginning of a long way from the age of 16 to the age of 30, then I was baptized in Sydney, Australia. (ABC, Oct. 13, 2004)

Former Israeli Prime Minister Banned from Campus

Two years after it banned former Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu from addressing its students, Concordia University, Ontario, Canada, has now banned another former Israeli prime minister, Ehud Barak. “At a peaceful demonstration outside Concordia’s downtown campus last week, speaker after speaker condemned the university for denying the principle of free speech.” (Australian Jewish News, Oct. 14, 2004) Tell that to David Irving who has faced bans organized by Jewish interests.

Spitting on the Cross – a Talmudic Edict?

The Armenian archbishop in Israel, Nourhan Manougian, did not like it when, during the procession of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross in Jerusalem’s Old City, a jeshiva student spat at the cross and at the Archbishop. The Archbishop retaliated by slapping the student, and during the ensuing brawl the Archbishop’s 17th century ceremonial Medallion broke. Religious Jews, among them yeshiva students, customarily spit on the ground as a sign of disgust on seeing the cross, as it is demanded by the Talmud. The Armenians, who live adjacent to the Jewish Quarter of the Old City, suffer from this phenomenon more than any of the other Christian sects in the Old City. “The Israeli government is anti-Christian,” Manougian charges. Lawmaker Rabbi Michael Melchior (Labor Party) says the phenomenon should be tackled through educational means. “I would expect prominent figures among the religious and ultra-Orthodox sectors, such as the chief rabbis, to denounce this phenomenon,” he says. (Ha’aretz, Oct. 11, 2004)

Battle over Al Aqsa Mosque Continues

Israel’s Antiquities Authority backed an assessment by police that the eastern wall of the mosque compound became increasingly unstable after an earthquake in February 2004, and it could collapse with an influx of large crowds during the holy month of Ramadan. Muslim clerics dismissed Israel’s claims, saying Arab engineers assured them the site was stable. Ikrema Sabri, mufti of Jerusalem, said: “The Israelis want to reduce the number of Muslims that visit the Al Aqsa compound for one reason only, and that is to create a role for themselves in administering the holy sanctuary and keep as many Muslims away from it as possible,” (The Australian, Oct. 14, 2004)